


a secret chord

by holdenscoffee (spacebarista)



Category: The Expanse (TV), The Expanse Series - James S. A. Corey
Genre: Child Care, Domestic Fluff, F/M, Fluff, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-16
Updated: 2017-01-16
Packaged: 2018-09-18 00:22:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9353903
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacebarista/pseuds/holdenscoffee
Summary: Jim's had trouble connecting with their daughter.





	

**Author's Note:**

> this little monstronsity was inspired by an image I got in my head and passed to Rachel (legitimate_salvage). as usual, it got away from me. title comes from “Hallelujah” which Jim sings because it’s been stuck in my head and I’d like to hear a certain someone sing it one day.
> 
> Hope y’all enjoy! please maybe think about leaving a review!

Naomi hums as she wanders, drifting through the _Roci_ looking for her daughter and her daughter’s father. With four crew members clamoring to spend time with little Sam, it’s not unusual to lose her somewhere. Amos had been the only one to see Jim take her. He’d asked him to let him have a head start before telling anyone. Naomi understands.

 

Jim rarely has time alone with Sam. It’s hard when you’re one of the most sought after men in the system. He gets called away and spends hours watching feeds and listening to and sending off transmissions and sleeping deep into the crew’s usual wake cycle. So she gets passed around between Alex and Amos and Naomi more often than not. Sometimes after her morning routine, Naomi meanders through the halls and putters in the galley just so he can bond with their daughter alone for a few minutes longer. She’s seen his quick-hidden pain when she’d reach for one of the other crew members when handed to him, or starts crying soon after he takes her. She feels a tightness in her own chest that likely rivals one in his. Father and daughter need to get to know each other better, quick. She’s fortunate enough that Amos and Sam get along so well, or it would really be a disaster.

 

She hears him before she finds them.

 

Jim has a lovely singing voice. It’s not something the rest of the crew hears often. He’s shy about it, keeps it close to his chest. No matter how hard she fights him to join her at karaoke, he always refuses with a smile. Yet when they’re alone—when he’s running his fingers through her hair as she dozes on his chest, or when he’s mindlessly working on something in their cabin—he’ll sing to her and to himself. It’s like a secret gift just for her. The distinctive baritone never fails to soothe her, just like the warmth of his speaking voice. It filters down the hall, increasing in volume as she approaches their cabin. Naomi strains to hear just what he’s singing, what he could be exposing their child to.

 

“ _The wheels on the bus go ‘round and ‘round, ‘round and ‘round, ‘round and—_ ”

 

The singing stops as she approaches the door.

 

“Oh… you don’t like that one?”

 

Naomi smiles, pictures Sam staring up at Jim, eyes wide and fixed on his eager face.

 

“No, of course you don’t. Too smart for that one. You take after your mom that way.”

 

The pride dripping from every word loosens the knot in her chest. Jim adored Sam from the moment Naomi told him she was pregnant, that the in vitro had been successful. The affection in his eyes when he held her for the first time had almost brought her to tears again. The idea of having a child at all seemed too distant, and sometimes too hard for him to talk about once the conversation became less hypothetical. He’d hoped to have children the old fashioned way. Even if he knew the possibility existed that he may have to rely on science, he wanted the passion. The love. Reality had hurt him. But holding and seeing Sam had healed the wound.

 

Until she began to show signs that she didn’t like him as much as the rest of the _Roci_ crew.

 

“Let’s see… what would the _very_ smart daughter of the _smartest_ person in the system like to listen to, hm?”

 

Naomi holds on to the handhold just outside their cabin, drinks in the calm silence that meets Jim’s question. Every part of her wants to lean around into the doorway, to watch her partner hold their daughter and smile at her with all the love he has. To watch two of the most important people in her life just be together. Jim makes an ‘aha!’ sound, and clears his throat before singing to Sam again. Naomi’s heard the song before. A melancholy tune with some sort of religious overtone. An old Earther song. She gives in, leans around the doorway just enough to peek at them.

 

Jim is curled in on himself, almost in a fetal position, with Sam seated in the curve of his lap and stomach. His hands hold onto her tiny waist. _Her_ hands rest on both sides of his face, slapping his stubbled jaw with glee. It doesn’t bother Jim. A smile lights his face that nothing could wipe away. He waits for a pause before carrying on with the song, going on about chairs and haircuts. Naomi spins back out to lean against the bulkhead. Her chest is warm and her eyes itching.

 

They’ve been through so much—she, Jim, the rest of their little family. There had been so many moments when she had thought this kind of future would be impossible for them. She and Jim had almost lost each other countless times. It had been hard for them to believe that things had settled down enough to discuss expanding their family. Months went by with little to the normal amount of conflict, and they could see it. They talked it over with each other, pitched it to Amos, asked Alex what he thought.

 

And now, years and years after the destruction of the _Cant_ , years after she had just about given up on any future with Jim, years after he accepted her invitation to bed, years after he saw the rift between them and closed it, years after he told her he _liked her_ and she told him she _loved him_ , years after she finally opened up to him and years after he accepted her past with an open heart, years after he’d joked he could marry them but he didn’t see the point and promised he’d always love her...

 

Here he is, hovering in their cabin singing to their daughter. Their daughter actually listening to him and playing with him. If Naomi hadn’t already seen so many miracles… she’d consider this a big one.

 

Soon, Jim’s voice softens as Sam’s cooing dies down. He still sings of flags and arches, of lords and hallelujahs. But Sam babbles at him less. Naomi closes her eyes and tips her head back against the bulkhead. She takes a deep breath, lets Jim’s voice soothe her as well. She shoves the fear and anxiety of their past back into the box she keeps all of her past in. The present, what’s going on in the room behind her now, is all that matters. She has Sam. She has Jim. Hallelujah indeed.

 

When Jim’s song dissolves into gentle humming, Naomi turns to enter the cabin. The breath is sucked from her lungs.

 

Sam is laying on Jim’s chest, jumpsuit balled in her tiny fists as she sleeps with her head just below his chin. Jim’s eyes are closed as he hums, thumb brushing over her back in a slow, soothing pattern. Naomi presses a hand to her lips. She could count on both hands how many times Sam had fallen asleep with Jim like this since they first brought her onto the _Roci_ , without Naomi around to soothe her. To see it now, the two of them by themselves, is just—

 

“About time you joined us.”

 

Naomi’s gaze shifts to Jim at his whisper. He watches her with one eye and a small grin. Giving him a grin of her own, Naomi pushes off the door way just enough to get her to where he is. Jim catches her with his free arm. She kicks on her mag boots and leans in to press a kiss to his brow.

 

“How did you know I was there?”

 

“I saw you peek in,” he mutters, glancing back at their sleeping baby. “You’re not very sneaky, honey.”

 

Naomi brushes her fingers through his hair. “Must not have been trying hard enough.”

 

“I was singing,” he notes with a thoughtful nod. “Always hard for you to resist.”

 

“Sure, Jim.” It’s true. But Naomi isn’t about to inflate that ego.

 

Jim starts to shift, and Naomi helps him straighten so he can heel his own mag boots on. Sam manages to sleep through all their movements. Certainly her father’s daughter. Naomi lifts her arms, starts to reach for Sam, like she has hundreds of times. She catches herself. There’s no need to take her. She’s sleeping, comfortable, _happy._ In the arms of her father. Why take her? Her heart clenches in guilt, but Jim doesn’t seem to notice. He’s so engrossed in watching Sam, eyes bright with wonder, pride, _joy_. So she shifts. Naomi wraps her arms around him instead.

 

“So,” he starts, tone unsure and eyes still downcast. “Were you worried about us?”

 

The uncertainty that Naomi had become so used to when it came to Jim talking about Sam was back in his voice. She’d had no intention of shaking his barely-there confidence. She rests her forehead against the side of his head.

 

“Only a little. I was just curious what you two might get up to.”

 

“Oh, absolute chaos, obviously.” The teasing tone she’s used to is a welcome relief. “Our next move was a hostile takeover of the galley. Barricade ourselves in and declare it for the Nagata-Holdens.”

 

Naomi smiles. “I’d be allowed in, right? I mean… I am the Nagata of Nagata-Holden.”

 

Jim snorts, turns in her arms to put Sam between them. “I’d never exclude you. Amos, maybe. Unless he promises to fix the coffee machine while he’s in there. You? Never.”

 

“Good. I think.” Naomi’s gaze shifts back down to their daughter, sandwiched between them. She lifts a hand to cover Jim’s on Sam’s back. “Jim… You know you’re doing a great job at this, don’t you?”

 

He hums. Naomi isn’t sure if it’s thoughtful or dismissive. “It’s hard to tell when she doesn’t seem to like me as much as all of you.”

 

“You’re busy. You get less time with her than we do.” Jim’s brow furrows, showing his dissatisfaction with her answer. Naomi reaches out to tip his chin up, to force him to meet her eyes. “Hey. You _try_. You know that you don’t get enough time with her and you know that she isn’t as fond of you and you _try_ to be a good dad anyway. You try to spend as much of your free time with her and you try to play with her. Because you _care_. That matters, and it will mean everything to her that you put so much effort into it.” She slides her hand back to twine in his hair and pulls his head in to press their foreheads together. “It already means everything to me that you care so damn much. You _are_ a good father, sa sa?”

 

She doesn’t have to say why. She doesn’t have to explain anything to him. He knows. Even if Jim doesn’t believe her, he knows where it comes from. He knows she means it. His wide eyes and parted lips evolve into a loving gaze and a warm smile.

 

“Well… I’m not quite sure what to say to that.”

 

“There’s a shock.”

 

Jim rolls his eyes and tips his chin out to catch her lips with his. Naomi hums into the kiss, presses closer to him. But then Sam makes a disgruntled sound and the two of them snap apart. Jim shushes her, rubs her little back and kisses her soft hair. Naomi soaks it in and lets it loosen the knot in her chest all the way. Any leftover anxiety she may have had about starting a family with Jim is long gone. There would be no repeats. Jim’s doing everything she’s ever wanted him to do. He peeks at her over Sam’s head, shoots her a tiny grin.

 

“Thank you,” he mouths, turning his attention back to their daughter.

 

He has nothing to thank her for. In fact, he’s only proven that she should be showing more gratitude. But Jim Holden would never accept that from Naomi Nagata. So she just nods, blows him one last kiss before making her way back onto the crew deck. She should find more work to do. Just for a bit longer.

 

Father and daughter will do just fine on their own.


End file.
